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Saturday, August 04, 2012

Has anybody of you ever had the idea to have an Arduino board remotly controlled!? If the answer is yes the good message is: there is an wonderful iPhone / iPad / Android App for that called NetIO. It's a very powerful and besides that generic solution (it's not just the App!!) to get your friends Arduino and iPhone connected. It communicates via a socket interface, http request will be supported soon. It comes along with a very nice webtool to design the iPhone App frontend and function. The outcome is a configuration file which will be loaded to the iPhone by using the simple fileshare mechanism of iTunes (in the Apple case of course).

I did a simple test setup to control a LED or whatsoever by using NetIO.

First thing I did was to do a bit of Arduino coding on the IDE version 0022 based on the code examples on the NetIO website. The hardware that's needed is the Arduino board plus a connected ethernet shield (see setup below). I adapted a view parts an ended up with the following sketch:

Of course it's not necessary to use the opto device. But the secondary circuit can simply be removed and the output could be used to connect to e.g. a remote control. In that case both circuits will be completely separated. You need to connect the ethernet cable and the power source for the Arduino.

layout in detail

As soon as that's done you can log on the NetIO webpage and design your App as described on the website.

After that you can download the xxx.Json file and add it to your iTunes library in the App/NetIO section. As soon as it is transferred to the iPhone correctly, the App connects to the Arduino and that's it. I know there is a bit more than that, but honestly: as soon as you worked out the system it's easy to adapt.

NetIO iPhone App screenshot

The good thing is that you can connect to multiple sources, also PC connectivity is given. And as soon as http requests are available with the App version 1.4, you could possibly control everything.

My next step will be to control a bit of my power stuff via FS20, like turning the lights on and off. My final goal is to setup a home automation server. And I guess it will be controlled via NetIO.